


Crooked

by DemonnPrincess



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Aftermath, M/M, Psychological, Rape Aftermath, Self-blaming, crook - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-13
Updated: 2018-07-13
Packaged: 2019-06-09 17:58:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15273117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DemonnPrincess/pseuds/DemonnPrincess





	Crooked

“This sucks!” Eren yelled, trudging down the middle of the night road. “I’m cold, why do I gotta be the one to go looking every time one of you guys wanders off past curfew?” The eleven-year-old folded his arms to try and keep warm, looking thoroughly at every building to the left and right as he slowly moved forward, his nostrils burning from continuously breathing in such low temperature air for an extended period of time. “Armin!” he yelled out annoyedly then waited for a reply. He noticed a slight movement in one window and focused on it, seeing the curtains flutter as a man inside the house straightened them out. There was a light on in the house, and he was able to see a family all getting ready for bed, a brother and sister that looked close in age both hugging each other good night. The mother was holding a newborn in her hands and seemed to have just finished feeding it and was sitting it up on her lap to burp it. She noticed Eren staring when she looked up, and she gave a warm smile and waved, her two oldest children following suit not too long after. He stared back at them for a little longer, then he felt a sharp cramp in the side of his chest, caused by obvious reasons. “Armin, it’s freezing!” he shouted, grabbing his chest and turning away, trying to pretend he didn’t see any of it. “Where the hell did you go?”

“Are you lost?”

Eren turned towards the voice, noticing a lady who had come out of a seamstress shop next to the lit window and was locking it up.

“I don’t know how things were in Shiganshina, but we have set times for minors to be out like this. It’s kind of late for you to be wandering around by yourself…”

“Uh,” Eren hurried over to her, shaking his head to ignore what she'd just said. “I’m looking for my friend. Did a blond kid come in there by chance?”

“A lot of blond people came in today.” the lady joked.

“He looks like a mop with blue eyes.”

“That’s not very nice.” She sighed over Eren’s chuckling. “I did see someone like that walking with you this morning though…oh, you mean the Arlert boy!”

“Yeah, him!” Eren said in a giddy tone while bouncing up and down.

“Okay, okay. I know who you’re talking about now. He is just too precious.”

“D’you see him?”

The lady shook her head. “I haven’t seen him at all since. Sorry.”

Eren nodded. “That’s okay. Thank you, I’ll just keep looking.”

“Well, my name is Emma.” the lady said, nodding her head once. “If I see him again I’ll let him know that…” She paused gesturing for Eren to speak.

“Eren.”

Emma nodded again. “I’ll let him know that an Eren was looking for him. Sound good?”

“Yes.” Eren nodded too. “Thank you.”

“Well, be safe.” Emma turned to start walking in the opposite direction. “Go straight home once you find him, you hear?”

“Yeah whatever, woman.” Eren mumbled to himself with his cheeks puffed out, continuing down the street. “You’re not my mom. I’ll go inside when I feel like it…”

“Oh, I forgot.”

“Ack!” Eren spun back around, waving his hands in front of his face. “I was just kidding!” he yelled back at the lady, assuming she’d heard him.

Emma started laughing. “You’re too cute.” she chuckled, gesturing to his clothes. “You and your friends, I noticed that a few of you who were brought here after that incident have some tears and whatnot in your clothes. I’d be happy to patch them up for free. Would you mind letting them all know? It’s the least I can do.”

“No, I don’t mind.” Eren shook his head. “Thank you again.”

“No problem.” The lady waved and then kept going her way. “And like I said, try not to stay out too late.”

“Yes ma’am.” Eren answered politely this time. He shoved his hands in his pockets and started up searching some more, lazily glancing at each of the buildings again. He looked back towards the lit window again subconsciously and saw that the two kids had both of their faces pressed against the window and were staring at him. The girl kept opening and closing her hand to wave, and Eren smiled and waved back. Then he looked over at the boy who was stretching his mouth wide with his fingers and had his tongue sticking out. “What the-”

“Nnnn!” the boy hummed through the glass. “Nnn-hnn!”

Eren scowled back and flashed a vulgar hand gesture to him, prompting both him and his sister to drop their jaws and turn around to tell their mother. “Oh crap.” Eren darted down a few buildings and scooted back onto the street, trying to be stealthy just in case the mother came rushing out to scold him. He exhaled, both out of relief and because the boy had annoyed him, then he heard a faint shout somewhere a few buildings down and stopped. “Hey, is somebody down there?” He waited again and realized that it was a constant shouting that he hadn’t heard further up the road. He turned around and looked back at the shop lady to see if she’d noticed, but she was already a bit of a ways away from him and didn’t seem to be reacting to it at all, meaning it wasn’t coming from her direction. He hurried down his way a few meters at a time to try and find the source.

“Why?!”

Eren spun his head around, hearing the distressed scream come from the side of one of the store buildings to the left of the road. “Hey, are you okay! Who’s down there!” He turned and sprinted to the building, hearing the voice much more clearly and being able to track it to a storage room on the side of the store. “Hey! Are you okay!”

“Why! _WHY?!_ ”

“…Armin?” Eren cringed at the boy’s high-pitched wails. He hurried up to the door and tried to open it, but it was locked. “Armin, open the door!” he yelled over the now very audible shouts. “What’s the matter!”

“ _I DON’T UNDERSTAND!”_ Armin screamed suddenly, startling Eren.

“Open the door!” Eren shouted even louder, pounding on the door with his fists. “Just open it!” He covered his ears as Armin’s screaming grew louder. “Open it!”

“ _OOOOOW! WHYYHYYY?!”_

“Armin!” Eren stepped back and started trying to kick the door in. Dust and other tiny debris from the doorframe would fall with each kick, and the frame around the door cracked slightly, but the door itself wouldn’t budge. He turned and started repeatedly ramming into it with his shoulder next, falling back and slamming into the ground almost every time. “Dammit, open it! Open the God damn door, Armin!” He spun around and looked down the alley, spotting some wooden crates stacked up against the wall. He ran and grabbed one, then came back and started bashing at the door with it. “Armin!” Eren swung the crate as hard as he could at the handle, but the crate burst sending shards of wood flying everywhere. He ran and got another crate, but it burst too on only the second strike. Out of desperation he put his mouth on the metal door handle and tried biting it off, growling at his failure. He grew frustrated and punched the door, then fell down in pain while clutching his arm. “Ouch…just open the damn door…” He waited for his hand to stop throbbing, then he looked back up at the door, realizing that Armin had quieted down. He got back up on his feet and kicked the door again. “Armin? Are you okay?”

“…oh God, why…”

Eren put his ear to the door, faintly being able to hear Armin mumbling on the other side instead of screaming. He also heard movement around the room. “Hey.” Eren banged on the door again.

“I don’t understand…” Armin was heard choking out through sobs now. “…why would you do this…I don’t understand…why, sir…”

“Armin!” Eren grabbed the handle, but it turned before he could try yanking it off again. He jumped back, watching as it opened inward a bit and a tall, intimidating military police officer stepped out, ignoring Eren completely and walking out into the alley. He heard Armin sobbing from inside the storage and he pushed the door open all the way, walking into a pitch dark and muggy room. “Armin?” He felt around, his hands gliding over various shelves full of unrecognizable-to-the-touch items, finally coming across a candle holder attached to the wall. There was the faint smell of smoke coming from it, and both the wick and wax were still hot to the touch. Eren reached into the back of the holder and pulled out a small box of matches that were conveniently being stored there. He struck one and used it to relight the candle, the room finally becoming easier to see in. “Okay.” Eren turned around while fanning the match, seeing rows of both metal and wooden shelves lining the walls, stacked with what he saw as useless junk. He turned around some more and found Armin curled into a fetal position on his side in the far corner, facing the wall. “Hey, what’s the matter?” he asked, tossing the match.

“I don’t understand…I just wanted extra rations…”

“Were you stealing it?” Eren asked, getting no response. “Why was the MP in here?” He walked up to Armin but froze, all the color running from his face upon realizing that Armin was completely naked from the waist down. “Ar…” He turned around and spotted his friend’s pants thrown on a shelf on the opposite wall, blending into the rest of the stuff. “W-what happened?” Eren inched closer to Armin, his entire body shaking. “What did he do?! What happened?!”

“He said I could come with him to get more food for us, but when I did, it…it just…” Armin started crying more audibly, making anything else he said incoherent.

Eren’s panicked expression grew. He looked Armin over, noticing a slow stream of blood and semen coming from the middle of his bottom and down the crease of his leg. “Oh God!” he yelled out in horror, falling backwards. He growled, looking around the room and spotting a metal pipe on one of the shelves. “You bastard!” He jumped up, grabbing the pipe and running back out into the alley, finding the officer who was leaning against the wall fixing the straps to his uniform. “What did you do?!” he screamed to him.

The officer looked down at him and scoffed before turning to walk away.

“I’ll kill you!” Eren yelled, tightening his grip on the pole and charging at him. “How _dare_ you!”

The officer moved out the way, causing Eren to run right into the wall.

Eren bounced backwards off the wall and landed right on some of the shards of wood he’d created from breaking the crates. “Ah!” He rolled over to get off of them, then he jumped right back up and charged at the officer again.

“Eren!”

Eren stopped and looked back in the room at Armin who hadn’t moved an inch.

“Please don’t leave me.”

Eren nodded, glancing back and forth between the police man who was casually strolling away and Armin. He growled again, squeezing the pole tightly before reluctantly sitting it down. “O-okay.” He went back over to Armin, pulling him up into a sitting position.

Armin arched his back immediately and leaned back over to get out of the sitting position. “It hurts.” he whined. “It hurts…”

Eren held his hands up ready to hug him but froze. “W-what do I do?” he looked around the room again. “I dunno what to do.” He looked down where Armin had been laying and noticed that the puddle of blood was much larger than he’d realized. “You’re bleeding too much and he did a bad thing. We have to go tell the grownups-”

“No!” Armin shouted, cutting Eren off. “No.”

“But we have to.” Eren mumbled. He sighed sympathetically when Armin grabbed onto Eren’s forearms and clutched them tightly. “There was a lady down the street I talked to a few minutes ago and she knows you. If we just go tell-”

“No…” Armin pressed his face into Eren’s chest and started sobbing some more.

Eren wrapped his arms around his friend, rubbing his back and comforting him as he cried, the tears soaking into his shirt. “Okay. We don’t have to.”

“…I was just trying to help.” Armin squealed in between hics. “I’m sorry…I just wanted to help…I-I got careless and…”

“None of this is your fault.” Eren rested his chin on top of Armin’s head. “Okay?”

Armin squeezed Erin’s arms tighter, crying even harder.

“…we’re gonna change this. We are.” Eren continued rubbing Armin’s back while still embracing him. “We’re gonna take back our land bit by bit, and we’re gonna make it safe to venture freely outside the walls. Then we’ll finally be able to see all the things you showed me in your books without having to be afraid. We might even see new things you’ve never read about and you’ll be able to write your own book one day. That’s gonna be awesome, being able to point to a book cover and showing off your name engraved on the leather and saying 'I grew up with this kid' and stuff.”

“…what’s cooler than fire that flows like water?” Armin laughed through his sobbing as he repeated the same line that they’d said to each other as an inside joke many times, his nose sounding stuffy.

Eren snickered too. “I don’t know. We’ll have to go out there and see for ourselves.”

Armin nodded, sniffing to clear his nose.

“We’ll change the world. There won’t be any more hurt, no more ‘strong picking on the weak’ mentality, no more…you, me and Mikasa, we’re gonna make it…I’mma protect you.” Eren hung his head, tightening his hug. “…you had to go through this alone…I’m so sorry. I skimped on coming to look for you because I just didn’t want to, and I was talking my sweet time and playing around...if I would’ve gotten here earlier…”

“……it’s not your fault.”

“It’s not yours either.” Eren said back, repeating himself from earlier. “It’s gonna be okay.” He felt Armin start to shiver, so he got up to retrieve his pants from the shelf.

“It still hurts, it…” Armin touched the back of his leg and brought his hand to his face, panicking at the two different bodily fluids smeared on his palm. “…what’s in me…” He started shaking even more, and he scraped his hand across the floor to get it off and scooted back against the wall, his breathing extremely fast. “I want it out!” he shouted, hugging himself and doubling over. “Get it out!”

“Armin!” Eren hurried back and dropped down in front of him. “Hey!” He grabbed Armin’s skull and lifted his head up, putting his forehead against his, feeling the vibrations in his voice as he shouted. “Breathe, breathe. It’s okay.” He looked down and realized that he’d grabbed a rag as well by accident when getting Armin’s pants. He picked it up and used it to wipe Armin’s palm. “Slow breaths…” He relaxed his demeanor, hoping that it’d influence his friend subconsciously which it eventually did to a small degree. Then he pulled him away from the wall and onto his knees.

“I want it out…get it out of me…”

Eren lifted Armin’s parts and looked underneath him. He noticed another tiny puddle under him, as well as a skinny, gooey strand stringing up from it that was coming from his backside. “It’s coming out.” he said calmly, sitting back up. “Just focus on me.” Eren put the towel down and grabbed Armin’s head again, placing his forehead against his again. “It’s okay, I’m right here.” He felt Armin’s shaky breath on his face start to calm a bit and he sighed quietly out of relief. He pulled his head down and placed it on his shoulder, rubbing the back of his scalp. “Um, can you push it out? Do you think…” He felt Armin tense up, so he started rubbing his head a little faster to calm him. “I’m so sorry. I know it’s a messed-up question, but it’ll come out, maybe.”

“…h…” Armin clutched the front of Eren’s shirt tightly and bore down, a squelching sound and a soft pat on the floor immediately following. He gritted his teeth out of humiliation but felt Eren still stroking his head and was able to keep himself calm.

“There. I think it’s all out.” Eren reassured, pushing the rag underneath Armin with his foot to wipe it away. “It’s all gone now, okay?” He felt Armin begin to sob again so he stayed quiet and held him, letting him let it out.

“How could he…” Armin dug his nails into the front of Eren’s shirt and hung his head down just over his friend’s lap. “W-w-when we got here there wasn’t any food and I a-asked…and he just…”

“It’s gonna be okay.” Eren said softly, holding onto Armin’s wrists to try and slow his convulsing.

“H-he just…he…” Armin’s shaking intensified and it came out with his voice which had a disturbing monotone-like feel to it that sent chills up Eren’s spine.

“It’s okay.” Eren tried to stay calm, Armin’s contagious state making him a little uneasy too.

“He undid his trousers and I just, I tried to run but I couldn’t get the door open…” Armin continued, almost in a trance-like state, his voice quivering so hard. “I couldn’t grab the handle. My hands were shaking and I couldn’t grab it.”

“Armin!” Eren grabbed onto his friend’s head like before. “Hey!”

“A-and I saw it, I saw it sticking out of his trousers and I just-”

“Hey!” Eren shook Armin’s head a little. “HEY!”

“I couldn’t move…I couldn’t…” Armin dug his nails even deeper into Eren’s shirt, causing tiny tears in the fabric. “I couldn’t get my arm away from him, I tried!”

“ARMIN!”

“I just wanted to know why!” Armin screamed over Eren. “I kept asking him and he just kept…I just wanted to know why!”

Eren squeezed Armin’s head tightly and shook it more violently. “STOPPIT! ARMIN! HEY!”

“IT WAS HURTING! HE WAS HURTING ME AND I JUST WANTED TO KNOW WHY! I WANTED TO KNOW WHY HE’D DO SUCH A THING!”

Armin’s high-pitched shrieking made Eren jumpy and made the hair on the back of his neck stand up. "Dammit, get a hold of yourself!" he yelled out in response to the tingling feeling that crept up his back.

“HE WOULDN’T ANSWER ME! HE JUST KEPT DOING IT!” Armin tore through Eren’s shirt even more, his nails latching onto his skin now.

“Ouch!” Eren yanked Armin’s head backwards to try and pull his hands off of him but he couldn’t.

“IT HURT! _IT HURT!_ ” Armin pierced Eren’s skin some more. “IT WASN’T HIS RIGHT! THAT WAS _MY_ CHOICE! IT WAS _MY_ CHOICE AND HE WOULDN’T LET ME HAVE IT! ALL I WANTED WAS RATIONS AND HE RAPED ME AND LEFT NOTHING!!”

“R…rape…what?”

Eren flipped his head around, spotting a woozy looking Mikasa at the door.

Mikasa put a hand on her forehead and shook her head. "Wait..."

“Mikasa, help me!” Eren yelled loud enough so she’d hear him over Armin, yanking Armin’s head back again. “I don’t know what’s wrong with him! I don’t know what to do!” Eren started tearing up, feeling his friends pain as he screamed and endlessly repeated everything that’d happened. “He won’t snap out of it!”

Mikasa’s hands started shaking too, but she squeezed them into each other to suppress it and ran up behind Armin, grabbing his upper arms to try and help calm him back down. “Armin! Armin?!”

“Come on Armin.” Eren pressed his forehead against Armin’s once again, speaking to him in as calm a manner as he could. “It’s okay, come on…it’s okay.”

"HE RAPED ME!” Armin screamed, trying desperately to fight his way out of his friends’ restraints. “HE RAPED ME! HE RAPED ME!”

Mikasa let her head fall onto Armin’s back, her heart breaking for him. “Oh my God…”

As if a switched had been flipped, Armin suddenly stopped fighting and collapsed to the side, almost taking Eren and Mikasa with him and triggering them to catch themselves and him. He started crying loudly and incoherently again instead of screaming words.

Mikasa, whose whole body was shaking too now, looked over at a teary Eren with a look of disbelief, hoping for Eren to give her some kind of confirmation that Armin was just confusing things and wasn’t realizing what he was saying, but Eren instead looked off to the side, causing the dread to grow even more in her. “Armin…” Her voice cracked, almost as if she was fighting the urge to cry. “…I…” She grabbed Armin's head and layed it in her lap. “How could this happen…I don’t…”

Armin turned his head to hide it in Mikasa’s lap, pulling his knees up to his chest.

Mikasa started to hyperventilate, but Eren snatched her wrist and squeezed it tightly to snap her out of it.

“Please stay with me.” Eren mumbled over Armin’s cries, his eyes bloodshot red. “I can’t have you freaking out on me too. I need you…I dunno what to do. I’m scared. What do we do? Tell me, please.”

Mikasa stared off blankly. “I……I don’t know.” She reached down and laced her fingers with Armin’s. "Maybe we can tell-" she paused, seeing Eren making a stealthy "no" gesture at her. "Right." she nodded reluctantly, smoothing Armin's hair. "I understand."

Eren wiped his eyes, then got Armin’s pants and slipped them back onto him. He lied down on his side in front of him and laced his fingers with the same hand Mikasa was holding. “Shhh.” Eren wrapped his other arm around Armin, pulling him off Mikasa and holding him to try and calm him some more. “You’ll be okay.” he said to him quietly. “Say it. Please. I need you to say it.”

“………I’ll be okay.”

Eren nodded, tearing up again upon hearing Armin and after seeing Mikasa's reaction to it of lowing her head so that her face would be hidden by her bangs. “Okay.” he sighed, hugging him tighter.

 

 

"Yeeeeehaaaaw!" Eren snatched up the five candies from the ground, turning around and jumping up and down in a celebratory manner. "I won, suckers!"

"You don’t have to be a sore winner though." One boy pouted, pulling another candy out of his pocket and sitting it down in the middle of the circle which was made up of him, the dancing Eren, and three other boys.

"Says the sore loser." Eren shot back, tossing two candies over to Armin, who was sitting with his back leaned against a wooden post several feet behind the circle of boys, enjoying a thick book quietly.

"Uh," Armin glared at one of the candies which had ricocheted off his forehead and landed on the book's pages. "thank you? Illegal gambling candy..."

"Oh shut up, you know you want some." Eren joked, sitting back in the circle.

Armin stuck his finger inside his mouth and stretched his cheek open. "This permanent tooth is coming in and it's still kind of sore. I can't eat it."

Eren blinked a few times. "Oh, well then just keep it until you can eat it."

Armin snickered and shook his head. "Thanks, then." He sighed, setting the candy that'd landed on his book in the grass next to him.

"You know you can join us if you want to." another boy called out to Armin. "You don’t have to sit there doing boring stuff all day like that." He stared at Armin and waited for a response but got absolutely nothing.

"He didn’t hear you." Eren shrugged, then leaned over and whispered in the boy's ear.

"Books...suck?" The boy repeated Eren's secret words, and to everyone else's amusement got Armin's immediate attention. "Uh," he laughed nervously and pointed at Eren. "He told me to say it. That was all him."

Eren playfully stuck his tongue out at Armin who just shook his head and chuckled again before going back to reading.

"Okay, hand over the candy."

The kids all sitting in the circle and Eren turned around and began moaning out of disappointed at the unexpected and sudden arrival of a few military police.

"The freaking MPs." The boy who'd lost to Eren groaned, scooping up what little candy he had left over.

 "The Shiganshina kid is involved _again_?" One officer asked, tsking at Eren. "Boy, your middle name must be Trouble."

"My name is Eren." he said sternly, kneeling down and helping the rest of the boys put the candy in a tub that another officer had kneeled down with.

"You boys have been told time and time again to stop gambling. It is against the law." The kneeling officer scolded. “We should only have to tell you once.”

Armin flipped the page in his book, tuning out all of the commotion. He saw a pair of legs walk up and stop right in front of him, about a meter away, and glanced up just enough to see the uniform and notice it was another military police officer.

"Yours too, Arlert." The officer demanded. "You have one in your lap."

Armin drummed his fingers on the pages, slightly peeved that Eren had gotten him into trouble too. He sighed and sat his book face down on a clean area of the grass, then got up with his candy in his hand.

"There. That’s all of it." Eren mumbled, dropping his last three into the bucket.

"Thank you." The officer with the bucket stood up, shaking it in front of his partner to show how much candy was in it. "Can you believe this?" He asked him, turning back to the kids. "Just play regular children’s games for crying out loud. There’s plenty of'em."

“But they’re not any fun!” one of the boys came back sternly. “We always see _you_ guys playing cards and betting beers. How come we can’t if you can?”

“Because we’re the adults, that’s why.” the officer said, amused. “There’s a lot of things adults do that you can’t. Just play tag or something for now on. I catch this again and your parents’ll be picking you up from your cells. I mean it, now.”

"Okay." All the kids groaned in unison.

"Man...I was gonna sell that candy for bread too…" Eren blew air, turning to go sit next to Armin and noticing that he was standing with his arm outstretched over another officer's hand, his entire body petrified and a look of horror on his face as he stared up at the officer.

"Come on." The officer made a come-hither motion with his hand at Armin. "Drop it. Didn’t food get you into trouble the last time too?"

Eren instinctively placed himself in between the two of them. He looked back at Armin, then up at the officer and froze too at the familiar face. “…you…” Eren grabbed onto the front of the officer’s shirt, trying to shake him with all his might but in reality barely making the man move an inch. “Trash!” he shouted, slapping his hand away. “You sick…tr-m-monster! You monster!”

“Hey!” One of the officer’s buddies walked up. “You assaulting a person of the military?”

“He is _not_ someone you should be defending! A few months ag-” Eren felt a soft hand tug at the back of his sleeve, making him stop. He turned and looked back at Armin, his friend’s head hung and his eyes hidden by his hair, his other hand still outstretched. “Armin…”

The familiar officer nodded and moved Eren out of the way, letting Armin drop the candy in his hand. “Thank you.” he mumbled, pocketing the candy and patting Armin on the head. “Good boy.”

Armin cringed slightly and gritted his teeth, turning and going back to his book, his head still hung.

Eren watched as the officers walked off, then he spotted a big dirt rock on the ground and started stomping it out of frustration.

“Eh,” one of the kids walked up to him. “it’s just candy though…it’s not that serious.”

“Get away from me or I swear to God.”

“O-okay.” The kid put his hand up and slowly backed away. “Sorry.”

Eren found another rock and stomped it apart as well, growling loudly, then calming down after a few seconds. He looked over at Armin, who was back to reading his book peacefully and quietly. He took a moment to try and calm himself some more, then he went and sat next to his friend, watching as his eyes scrolled across the pages as he read the unfamiliar and difficult words, one of his hands being used to play with the ends of a lock of his hair, a calm, peaceful look on his face to match his aura. He decided to stay quiet and leave him alone, and instead started observing the people walking along the streets instead.

“……..I mean…it’s not the only unfair thing that’s happened to me I suppose.”

Eren stayed looking out at the street, not knowing what to say or whether or not he’d make it worse by speaking in the first place.

“I’ve had things taken from me before.”

Eren finally looked back over at Armin, watching as he flipped a page with his other hand before placing it back on the grass.

“My parents, and then my Grandpa, anything those bullies would take, our entire village and the only place we knew as home. I lost all those things, and I’m coping with it fine, relatively. He took sex. Granted, it hurt terribly so the pain itself was physical, but it wasn’t anything physical that he took, so this shouldn’t really be any different, I suppose.”

Eren looked away from Armin’s peaceful face expression and back down at the book, seeing more unfamiliar words on one page and some sort of large schematic on the other of an unrecognizable machine, possibly a predicted device to exist in the future. He saw something pat on the page right on the edge of the schematic and noticed it was a drop of water, like rain. Then another, and soon he realized it was coming from Armin. He looked back up at Armin and noticed that his cheeks had tears streaming from them now despite his calm expression.

“…so then, why can’t I let this go? If it’s the same, then why am I still…”

Eren noticed that Armin’s hand was trembling on the grass. He reached down and laced his fingers in it. He briefly looked over at the other boys and noticed that they were all staring at Armin with confused but concerned looks. Eren nodded to them quietly, letting them know that he was okay and to leave him alone.

“I read every book I could find.” Armin wiped his hand across the pages to wipe away the wetness, then turned the page again, his tears having soaked through to that page as well. “Every book I read said the same thing. They said I’d feel this way, but…I’m still here, I’m still me. Literally every part of me that existed before he did what he did is still here now because he didn’t take anything, but I feel worse than when all the other things were taken combined, like something in me is missing…none of the books say why that is, they just say that I will feel it. When I ran out of books I reread the same ones, and…nothing.”

Eren squeezed Armin’s hand tighter.

“…when something scares me, I have to understand it. But I can’t understand this…I can’t understand why I’m hurting like this, and I can’t understand why he’s not in trouble.”

“You told?”

Armin wiped his face, nodding. “About a week after, I went by myself and told everything in excruciating detail with him standing right there. They told me they’d deal with it, albeit after making a sly remark about how I shouldn’t have been out after curfew in the first place, and yet…”

“They did _what_?” Eren took some breaths to keep himself from raging.

“…and yet…” Armin continued, unintentionally ignoring Eren. “Just like when my parents first died. It hurt and it felt unfair, and literally my only option was to just push forward, so I did. And again when the world took my Grandpa, and again every time I was bullied and beaten up, and again and again…” He paused, feeling a painful lump in his throat forming. “Why can’t I move past this?” he whispered; any louder and he would’ve started crying out loud. “What is wrong with me? Why won’t any of this make any logical sense? ...what did he do to me?”

“Hey, hey.” Eren swooped Armin’s hair out of his face with one hand, using his other hand, which was still laced with Armin’s, to rub their hands across the grass blades, trying to redirect Armin's senses.

“He broke me. He-”

“You’re not in that storage anymore.” Eren intervened.

Armin nodded, glancing past Eren and at the building down the street where the storage room was located, its front doors open to let customers in and out as they did, everyone around the building in a cheerful mood. One of the female owners came out of the store carrying an empty potato bucket and went around to the side where the storage door was. Armin averted his gaze, his breathing becoming labored.

“It’s just a building.” Eren said, gesturing to the store. “It’s not sentient and it’s not supernatural. You’re not trapped there anymore, and it doesn’t have the ability to hold anything that that man took from you hostage. Okay?” He waited for Armin to nod, then continued. “You’re outside, with all these people who care about you. Except those few MP’s, screw them…the wood in the storage was dyed brown but the grass we’re sitting on is dyed green…it’s dyed, right?”

Armin snorted accidentally, shaking his head. “No, no-no. Eren…”

Eren grinned, relieved he could make his friend smile. “Just kidding. I’m just playing dumb to try to get you to laugh. I know grass is green because it has chloroform in it. That’s how come people sleep so good on it.”

Armin pressed his arm over his mouth and gave Eren a strange look, waiting for him to say that he was kidding again, his expression getting even stranger when Eren said nothing. “Chloro- _phyll_.” he corrected.

“I knew that.” Eren blurted out, his cheeks getting hot. He pulled Armin’s head down and rested it on his shoulder, squeezing his hand again to try and keep it from shaking.

“Chloroform _does_ smells like grass though, so in a weird way you aren’t far off. I’ll let you have that one then.”

“See, I _am_ smart.” Eren joked back, digging his chin in top of Armin’s head to noogie him.

Armin nodded, then took a deep breath and sighed, placing an index finger on a reference in the book saying “figure 1.3” and using his middle finger on the same hand to point to the figure, making a mental note of both of those areas. “…it doesn’t seem like he does that often…I think he only wanted me. He got what he wanted…no one else will be harmed. So at least that’s good…for what it’s worth, I guess……but I still can’t…”

Eren felt Armin shake his head slightly to try and push back some thoughts. He grabbed the same lock of Armin’s hair that he himself was messing with earlier and started playing with it now. “Are you gonna be okay?”

“Y……yes.” Armin slid his book over so that half of it was on Eren’s lap now. “Maybe.”

Eren reached down and turned the page for Armin, figuring he’d already finished reading that page.

“…I don’t know…”

Eren put his arm around Armin and rubbed his shoulder, trying to reassure him.

“Bookworm.” One of the boys from the circle crawled over. “You and your boyfriend done talking?”

“Will you just disappear!” Eren yelled. “He’s not in the mood and neither am I.”

“Yeah I bet.” The boy joked, flipping on his back and lifting his hand up. “Here.”

Armin looked up, noticing the boy carefully sitting an orange onto the book, the kind gesture almost making him cry again. “Thank you.” He took the orange and bit into it like an apple.

Eren grimaced, then turned and grabbed another orange from the boy. “Thanks.” he said, peeling the skin back before eating it.

The rest of the boys came over and sat in front of Armin and Eren, two of them also biting into the skin rather than peeling it.

“What…the Hell?!” Eren gawked, staring at them.

The third boy pointed to Armin. “He’s really smart, so if _he_ eats the skin then there might be a good reason to eat it.”

Eren blinked a few times, still staring at them. “Yeah, I’ll pass.” he snickered, watching the same boy’s eyes start to water. “It’s gross isn’t it? That’s what you get.”

“Health is more important.” the boy whined with chewed up orange falling from his mouth, making the others laugh at him.

“Are you okay now?”

“Huh?” Armin looked down at the boy who’d given him the orange; he was smiling back up at him.

“You looked like you were sad. Whenever I’m sad my mom gives me oranges, and then I feel better because it’s my favorite food, even though they’re hard to get. Are you okay now?”

Armin took another bite of his orange and went back to reading. “No. But that’s okay.”

The boy nodded. “Okay.” he replied, still smiling. “It takes a minute to start kicking in.”

Eren smiled at Armin too, swooping his bangs out of his face again.

"Thank you." Armin mumbled quietly, squeezing Eren's hand tighter.


End file.
